Biker's Diaries

Saturday, 14th June, 2008, 6.30 pm


BULLETS AND BUTTERFLIES


Sushmit Ghosh, 41 minutes, 2007


Friday, 13th June,  2008, 6.30 pm


RIDING SOLO TO THE TOP OF THE WORLD


Gaurav Jani, 94 minutes, 2006


Nani Cinematheque, Centre for Film and Drama
5th Floor, Sona Towers, 71 Millers Road, Bangalore 560052


Screenings open to members only. If you are not a member, please come to the venue half an hour before the screening and register. Two month membership and single entry options available.


Synopses:


BULLETS AND BUTTERFLIES
Sushmit Ghosh, 41 minutes, 2007


A strange couple travel a distance of 1500 kilometers over 7 days – an unprecedented ride that takes them through plains, hills and into mountains; marked by narrow escapes and introspective conversations; breathtaking sights and an uncanny contrast of people. Travellers-turned-cameramen, they shoot the ride on the go, enthusing the film with their refreshingly ingenuous approach to capturing the ride on video. Funny thing is that this strange expedition was never intended to be a film…


Bullets and Butterflies traces the journey of a handicapped street child and a biking enthusiast on a motorcycle – popularly known as a Bullet – as they travel from the bustling cityscape of Delhi to the serene hills of Himachal Pradesh. It is the journey from a promise made during a fleeting conversation to its fulfillment in an unforeseen, bizarrely deep understanding between the odd pair; inadvertently providing an insight on differently-abled people and the hardships of a life lived on the streets.


Sushmit Ghosh is a film student at the Mass Communication Research Center, Jamia Millia University in New Delhi and this is his first independent documentary.


RIDING SOLO TO THE TOP OF THE WORLD
Gaurav Jani, 94 minutes, 2006


Riding Solo is a film about filmmaker Gaurav Jani’s solo motorcycle journey from Mumbai to one of the remotest places in the world, the Changthang Plateau in Ladakh, bordering China. The film is even more extraordinary for the fact that Jani was a one-man crew who loaded his 200 kg bike with over 100 kgs of equipment/supplies and set off on a journey to one of the world’s most difficult terrains.


He returned after 70 days with 40 hours of recording and clueless about the next step. Friends and strangers who believed in the project joined in and after two and half years the film was finally out.


Quoting Gaurav Jani, “Riding solo for us is not about one man’s motorcycle journey. It is about the journey of everyone who put in their energy, money and time behind the film. The lows they have experienced are much more agonizing than camping in sub zero temperatures and functioning as a one man film unit at 16,000 plus feet.”